Scalpels are widely used in surgery the world over. Conventional scalpels used in surgical procedures typically have a cutting blade attached to a metal handle. The blade is attached to the handle via a slot formed in the blade and a corresponding track or lug protruding from the handle. The extremely sharp cutting edges of the blade expose users of scalpels to the risk of accidental cutting or puncturing (or so-called “sharps accidents”). For example, during use in surgery, scalpels can accidentally cut a surgeon's fingers, or the fingers of nurses and other support personnel. Also, the potential for accidents is high when for example the scalpel is being passed back and forth during an operation. If the surgical glove and skin of the surgeon or nurse is accidentally cut via a scalpel blade, there is a risk of transmission of blood borne infectious diseases, and loss of sterility.
To better avoid sharps accidents, various safety scalpels have been developed and made available for use in surgeries, and other medical and non-surgical procedures. Safety scalpels typically have a blade that slides in and out of a cavity in a handle or alternatively a shield that slides over the blade. With proper use of these types of safety scalpels, the sharp edge of the blade is not exposed, except during actual use of the scalpel. However, a problem with these types of safety scalpels is that the cavity in the handle provides an area where blood or other tissue can be deposited. A similar problem arises with safety scalpels that have shields to protect the blades because the shields can also catch and contain tissue, congealed blood, and the like, making it difficult to ensure that the shields are surgically clean to permit the handles with the attached shield to be reused. Cleaning and sterilizing safety scalpels can, therefore, be difficult and/or time consuming, resulting in increased costs and preparatory handling time associated with using safety scalpels.
Irrespective of the above challenges associated with safety scalpels, use of safety scalpels can prevent sharps accidents. However, many surgeons are reluctant to use such safety scalpels for various ergonomic or performance reasons. A common complaint cited against safety scalpels is that they are often of a different size, shape and weight to conventional non-safety scalpels comprising metal handles. For example, to allow reusability the shields must be fairly robust which can result in the shields being of fairly complex manufacture, quite bulky, and quite expensive. As well, typical shield systems often require complex locking and refraction mechanisms that are not user-friendly.
Many surgeons trained with conventional non-safety scalpels object to using safety scalpels because the grip, balance, weight, and/or overall feel of safety scalpel handles are different from conventional scalpel handles. For example, the presence of cavities for blades further creates scalpel handles that are dissimilar to the shapes or weights of conventional scalpel handles. Likewise, the presence of shields for the blades produces different shaped and weighted scalpel handles. The physical and practical differences between conventional safety scalpels and traditional non-safety steel-handled scalpels have reduced the uptake and use of conventional safety scalpels by practitioners of medical sciences or other users.
The different shape of conventional safety scalpels presents further disadvantages. In general, the surgeon's visual sight lines to the blades of conventional safety scalpels are also not as good as with a conventional scalpel, because the front end of the safety scalpel handles are wider, and often also taller, than the front end of conventional scalpel handles. This problem can also limit surgeons' ability to make plunging or puncturing incisions using conventional safety scalpels. As a result, practitioners of medical sciences or other users are reluctant to adopt conventional safety scalpels. There continues to be a need, therefore, for safety scalpels that avoid the drawbacks of conventional safety scalpels and that offer a level of comfort and familiarity to the user.
This background information is provided for the purpose of making known information believed by the applicant to be of possible relevance to the present invention. No admission is necessarily intended, nor should be construed, that any of the preceding information constitutes prior art against the present invention.